Acting Chief Justice Antonio Carpio has officially turned down his automatic nomination to the top judicial post left vacant following the ouster of Chief Justice Ma. Lourdes Sereno last month.
“I am declining my automatic nomination for Chief Justice,” Carpio said, in a letter addressed to the 7-man Judicial and Bar Council.
Carpio’s decision not to seek the chief justice post has left four other senior associate justices of the SC—Presbitero Velasco Jr., Teresita Leonardo de Castro, Diosdado Peralta, and Lucas Bersamin—as possible contenders for the most coveted post in the judiciary.
As of this writing, none of the four has accepted their automatic nomination as the top magistrate.
Carpio’s earlier pronouncement that he would not seek the chief justice post out of propriety considering that he voted against the quo warranto petition against Sereno, prompting former chief justice Hilario Davide to call on the JBC to still consider Carpio’s automatic nomination.
Davide said, “delicadeza should no longer be invoked because the decision in the quo warranto case is final.”
“Personal consideration must now yield to the demands of public interest,” Davide added.
Meanwhile, Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra confirmed on Tuesday that the JBC would be requiring all nominees including the five senior associate justices of the Supreme Court to formally accept their nomination before they can be considered for the position left vacant.
Guevarra, one of the ex-officio members of the JB, said the rule requiring the consent of the nominee for a judiciary post would stay as agreed upon by the council during its meeting last Friday.
“The same rule will continue to be applied, the nominee even the most senior one, must agree to be nominated,” Guevarra said in a text message.
The nominees for the judiciary post should first accept their nomination prior to the submission of the requirements such as bank statements, Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net worth and other documents.
The JBC is constitutionally tasked to screen applicants and come up with a shortlist of nominees for vacancies in the judiciary and the Office of the Ombudsman and recommends appointees to the Office of the President.
The 1987 Constitution requires that the Chief Justice position must be filled within 90 days from vacancy, which means that President Rodrigo Duterte needs to appoint ousted top magistrate Sereno’s replacement by September 16.
Sereno was ousted by his colleagues based on the quo warranto petition filed by Solicitor General Jose Calida, which sought to nullify her appointment for her failure to comply with the requirements to qualify for the post.
The SC formally opened last June 26 the search for the post of Chief Justice after it affirmed last June 19 its ruling which granted the quo warranto.
The JBC is set to have its first deliberation on the chief justice post on August 3 after receiving all of the applications and nominations by July 26, the deadline for all applications and nominations for the CJ post.
